


The Man Who Counts Waves

by WolfAndHound_Archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Post-Sirius in Azkaban, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-18 21:02:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5942989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolfAndHound_Archivist/pseuds/WolfAndHound_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If he stops counting he'll remember who lives on the other side of that azure flood, and then he would walk into the sea and never return. So he counts the waves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Man Who Counts Waves

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Lassenia, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Wolf and Hound](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Wolf_and_Hound), which was created to make stories posted to the Sirius_Black_and_Remus_Lupin Yahoo! mailing list easier to find. However, even though I still love the fandom, I am no longer active in it and do not have the time to maintain it. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in December 2015. I posted an announcement with Open Doors, but we may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on the [Wolf and Hound collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/wolfandhound/profile).

Someone told him once that the seventh wave was always larger than the other six; stronger, higher, deeper. So he sits and counts. Sits on the beach like driftwood, cast up on the shore of his life. He counts the waves. Counts from one to six. Endlessly, until the seas run dry. Counts to seven then stops and counts again for if he stops counting he'll remember who lives on the other side of that azure flood, and then he would walk into the sea and never return. So he counts the waves.

Days turns into weeks and weeks turn into months. And still he sits here every day, ignored by the tourists, who see his tattoos and long scraggy hair and mark him down as some aging hippy, catered to politely by the locals. They bring him everything he needs. Some come to the little shack behind the fringe of trees, but most attend him here. Leave their mangos and melons and pineapples, take the money he leaves scattered on the sand and scurry away, nervous chickens, frightened by the vacuum of his eyes, frightened that if they make eye contact their souls might be sucked in to replace the one he has obviously lost.

Or so the locals believe. He has become a legend on the island. They hear him counting, and they are kind to him, because they are kind to mad people and it is clear that the man who counts waves is mad.

When the sun slips over the horizon, watched by eyes that have no end, he stands and walks back to the palm-fringed shack and sleeps. But as he drifts into sleep, the sheep turn to waves and the noises of their bleating becomes no louder than the whisper of white powdered sand, dragged back by the seventh wave. As the sun returns he does no more than is necessary before returning to make sure that six still comes before seven.

Perhaps, think the locals, as they meet in the ramshackle bar and speak in hushed tones of the man who counts waves, perhaps he is waiting for something. Some think he's waiting to die, but others think he's already dead, but they don't name the thing they believe him to be. No-one knows, and after a few months, they've forgotten to care, but they bring him fruit and meat and take his money. No-one has ever heard him speak to another living soul.

But the man who counts the waves speaks only to the creature who hides in his room, speaks only when they soar into the darkness and leave the island far below. Then he whispers in the creature's ear and only the creature knows the secrets the man holds, why they only fly on moonless nights and why he counts the waves.

The tourists have gone, the weather shifts and the sea strengthens. It is hardly necessary to count the waves now, for each swell of nature is markedly its own presence as they swarm up the beach, running for cover from the force of the wind they know is coming. The palms begin to whip and the man's hair is blown ragged from the sea, the salt spray hits his face and if anyone were there to see they might have noticed that his eyes pour waves of their own.

The beach is deserted, the locals safe in their houses, the tourists flying home to safety, but the man counts the tears on his face and returns the salt to the sea. He stands ankle deep in the warm water, blood red from the setting sun, letting the battering water count for him, each wave a metronome of a name he can never say.

A hand in his, and his eyes flash disbelief, and for a moment he wonders if the natives are right, after all, and he is mad, or dead. But the man who leads him down into the sea seems real, the man who kisses him feels flesh and blood, the man with the moon rising in his eyes feels just like he always did as he pulls him deep into the blood warm shallows and peels him easily like the ripest fruit.

In a rush of saline current, much of what has been lost is returned from the sea. Memories flood his mind as the water finds its own level. Visions of dirt and darkness are washed away in the newcomer's welcome. There are the hands he knows, each scar a benediction and a reproach; this is the mouth he knows, sweet and claiming and filled with every part of him, the proudest part of him, prouder still for being engulfed by those eager tender lips. This voice, calling him back from the endless dark without a moon, those eyes which give him back the heart long kept in his safety; this joining which rescues his tears from the void of the ocean, this reaffirmation of a trust long broken. This man saves him from ever having to count the waves again.


End file.
